Crossroads of Ideas
For Radiolab co-host Latif Nasser, the best part of journalism is that it turns the world into a scavenger hunt. Instead of Easter eggs, journalists look for true stories. But how do you find them, especially ones that haven’t already been covered to death? And once you do land one, how do you tell it in a way that keeps your listener holding their breath to hear more?
For the first part of this event, Latif will share a few of his best tricks to ferret out original and surprising stories that others look right past. From there, he’ll be joined on stage by his friend Soren Wheeler, executive editor at Radiolab; together they will chat about their decade of telling stories together, their biggest triumphs, their biggest mistakes, their hardest-won lessons.
It promises to be an evening of swashbuckling nerdery!
Latif Nasser
Latif Nasser is co-host of the New York Public Radio show Radiolab, where he has done stories on everything from professional badminton to the nuclear button to a polar bear who liked to have sex with grizzly bears. Latif also hosted the miniseries “The Other Latif,” about a Guantanamo detainee who shares his name. In addition to his work in audio, Latif is the host and executive producer for the Netflix science documentary series, Connected. He has given two TED talks and written for the Boston Globe Ideas section. He got his Ph.D. from Harvard’s history of science department in 2014.
Soren Wheeler
Soren Wheeler is the executive editor at Radiolab, where he plays a variety of roles, including producer, editor and reporter. He also oversees the development of future content. Before coming to radio, Soren spent 10 years working with science teachers and writing about how kids learn science. He was a project coordinator at the Association for the Advancement of Science, where he co-authored the book Atlas of Science Literacy. He then went on to get a master’s degree in science writing at Johns Hopkins University. Soren has won awards for production on radio pieces about coincidence and statistics, the periodic table and the story of a woman waking up from a coma.